The Supreme Court of Canada affirmed on Friday that Ontario public school board teachers are entitled to protection against unreasonable search and seizure in their workplace under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The decision reinforces that public school boards are an arm of government, making them subject to the Charter.

The case in question revolved around two teachers employed by an Ontario public school board who had documented private communications about workplace issues on a shared, personal, password-protected log stored in the cloud.

The controversy began when a school principal, having knowledge of this log, entered a teacher’s classroom after school hours to return teaching materials. Finding the teacher absent but the school laptop open, the principal accessed the device and viewed the log, taking screenshots with his cellphone. Subsequently, the school board used these communications to issue written reprimands to the teachers.

The teachers’ union contested these reprimands, arguing that the search violated the teachers’ workplace privacy rights. Initially, a labour arbitrator ruled against the union, finding no breach of the teachers’ reasonable expectation of privacy vis-à-vis the school board’s management interests.

The union escalated the matter to the Divisional Court of Ontario’s Superior Court of Justice, which upheld the arbitrator’s decision, asserting that Charter protections against unreasonable search and seizure did not extend to workplace environments absent a criminal context.

Undeterred, the union pursued an appeal at the Ontario Court of Appeal, which overturned the Divisional Court’s ruling. The Court of Appeal determined that Ontario public school boards are indeed subject to the Charter, and the principal’s search constituted an unreasonable intrusion under section 8 of the Charter, which protects against unreasonable search and seizure. The initial arbitration failed to properly balance Charter protections with the statutory objectives under section 265 of the Education Act.

The school board then sought recourse at the Supreme Court of Canada, which ultimately dismissed the appeal.

Writing for the majority, Justice Rowe emphasized that Ontario public school board teachers fall within the scope of section 32 of the Charter as entities performing governmental functions. Consequently, section 8’s protection against unreasonable search and seizure applies to their workplace interactions. The Court found that the arbitrator had erred in not considering this Charter framework, thereby necessitating the overturning of her decision.

As a section 8 and 32 Charter issue, the decision has a wide impact on unionized groups and governmental authority over them. The teachers were represented by the Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario, supported by interveners such as the Power Workers’ Union and the Society of United Professionals. The York Region District School Board received support from interveners such as the Ontario Principals’ Council.